Language questions for fanfictions

Malte279 · **Reply #40 on:** January 03, 2005, 05:36:33 PM

Thanks a lot for your help Jojo!
It's the kind of stuff you won't find in dictionaries, so information like "yer" and "cain't" being associated with the southern US and "ye" being just archaic or associated with pirates is really valuable for me.
I'll stick to ya and can't then.
Does the "pointyheads" sound alright to you as a derrogatory word for threehorns? I do have the sound of LBT 3 burned on a CD, but like I said, it is sometimes very difficult for me to figure out any speech patterns. So any help is really appreciated.

Nick22 · **Reply #41 on:** January 03, 2005, 05:37:35 PM

Ye was used in Middle English as well Jojo.
Nick

Malte279 · **Reply #42 on:** January 03, 2005, 05:42:08 PM

So it was used in Shakespeare's time. But what Hyp is speaking probably sounds more like the way the hated idiot from the high school who will bully around the lower grade students talks like, doesn't it?

Malte279 · **Reply #43 on:** February 14, 2005, 05:04:15 PM

Again I need the opinion of as many native English speakers as possible.
I need to know if an idiom which I'd like to use in my current LBT story is commonly known so I can use it without causing any difficulties to the readers.
If a dinosaur in my story says:

"We cannot turn tail on them!"

What do you think does it mean? What does this phrase "to turn tail on s.th. / s.o." stand for?

Nick22 · **Reply #44 on:** February 15, 2005, 10:15:17 AM

Well, 'To turn tail ' means to run away. In this case, your dinosaur is saying that isn't an option. " We can't turn tail on them", means, depending on the context, " We can't leave them like this" or " We can't just run away." I think that the first definition applies here('we can't leave them like this').
Nick

Malte279 · **Reply #45 on:** March 07, 2005, 11:27:17 AM

Hi!
Again I need the advice of the native speakers for the English in my fanfiction:

Quote

...and with another roar he raised his head for the fatal staband thrust downwards.

As you will notice we are talking of quite dramatic a moment. It is the underlined words "stab" and "thrust" I'm wondering about. A third word that had come to my mind in this context is "butt" (with the character who is stabbing, thrusting or butting being a threehorn).
I'm not sure if the word "stab" is too associated with a manmade pointed weapon to be used refering to horns. In case of the "butt" I'm not certain if the word makes clear that we are not talking of somebody just knocking somebody around with the head, but of somebody who really means to use the points of his horns to kill. Do you think that the choice of words as given above is appropriate? Or are there some totally different words coming to your mind?

Another question is about terms to describe a "tiny distance". I don't think that the dinosaurs are measuring in inches or centimeters so if I'm telling from a dinosaur's point of view I want to avoid such terms. In one case I spoke of "a horns breadth (with the character from whose point of view the story was told being another threehorn and very few dinosaurs sporting "hairs" which would permit the use of the rather human phrace "by a hair's breath"). However, are there any English words that come to your mind that describe a very small distance without being as exclusively human terms as any measures are?

Nick22 · **Reply #46 on:** March 07, 2005, 02:38:51 PM

Well, stab is associated with knives and thrust can refer to different things, inculding acclerating on a plane(the pilot used his thrust), or moving forward with a weapon(he thrust his sword at the dragon) "Butt' can mean to knocks heads or it can be a warning to stay out(butt out). As For your phrase, "By A whisker' comes to mind, but that refers to furry animals and dinosaurs didn't have whiskers. 'By the skin of your teeth' could work, after all dinosaurs had teeth. I thionk the words are apropriate in the context.
Nick

Malte279 · **Reply #47 on:** March 07, 2005, 04:30:48 PM

Thank you Nick!

Nick22 · **Reply #48 on:** March 07, 2005, 05:20:03 PM

No Problem.
Nick

Malte279 · **Reply #49 on:** March 11, 2005, 07:06:32 PM

Again I need the native speakers' assistance. Imagine somebody has bitten very fiercely on the own tongue, so the tongue has swollen to almost double size which makes that given character talk very thickly. Is there any good term to describe that way of speaking? I have come across a number of terms, most of which didn't seem to fit at all. So far my best choice would be "to babble". What do you say? Is that a fiting term to describe the way someone with a badly bitten and swollen tongue talks?
I have never had the fortune (

) to have a merry chat with an Englishman or American who had bitten the own tongue, so I can only guess how it might sound. I want to immitate the way it would sound if a character with a bitten tongue is talking. Here are two examples of my guess how it might sound. Do you think that these lines sound like somebody with a bitten tongue but are still intelligible? The "translation" of what the character is really saying is in the the brackets:
"Now Topsh ish looging afder her." ("Now Tops is looking after her.")
"I dond no anyshing abaut her. I didnd shee her. If she really... She musht have gone wish Torush! Hesh ad dshe Didsh nau! Perhapsh we bedder hurry ub!" ("I don't know anything about her. I didn't see her. If she really... She must have gone with Torus! He is at the Ditch now! Perhaps we better hurry up!")
It would be really great if you could help me out with my "tongue-problems"

:

Malte279 · **Reply #50 on:** March 11, 2005, 07:26:58 PM

Another question. There is one idiom in German which littereally translated reads: "Water is reaching up to somebody's throat" meaning that somebody is in very serious trouble. Would that idiom be understood by English readers? Or if that is to be doubted, is there any English idiom which associates water with trouble? It would offer me the chance for quite a nice pun.

Petrie · **Reply #51 on:** March 12, 2005, 08:47:35 AM

If it's hard to understand someone, we would say they're mumbling rather than babbling....babbling means someone is continually excessively talking without any real meaning. With the sentences you gave, maybe it's just me, or maybe it's intentional but a toungue would bleed if it was bitten, not swell so I guess if it's intentional to do something different, your sentences are fine.

Ah....the water one. If somebody's in trouble, they're in hot water.

Hope that helps.

Malte279 · **Reply #52 on:** March 12, 2005, 12:52:46 PM

Hi!
From painful personal experience I can assure you, that you are mistaken about the tongue just bleeding but not swelling if it is bitten on. During cramps I had during my comas I bit deep into my tongue, and I can assure you that the volume of this organ increases quite a bit if treated like that. Fortunately the tongue “repairs” itself very quickly (so the character in my story won’t have to talk that stupid for long), but it really does swell. I have some rather nasty photo material on what shape and size it can take. Regrettably I failed to try talking English in that situation

, so my guesses on how it might sound are based on what sounds I recall getting difficult to handle with an oversized tongue (especially t and sharp s sounds).
Thanks a lot for the word “mumbling”. For some reason I had always associated that one with indistinct talk due to the talking being very quiet, but indeed the definition provided by the Oxford dictionary qualifies it much better for what I want to mumble than the word “babble” does. Thank you Arvens!
Continuing my research after posting the message here I came across one supposed idiom which would fit just perfectly into my story. That idiom reads: “To be in deep waters” for being in trouble. Do you think that idiom will be understood? It would sound even better as the very trouble we are talking about in the story is partly caused by water, which however is not hot.

Petrie · **Reply #53 on:** March 12, 2005, 11:21:25 PM

I'll skip the photo shoot thanks.

I'll take your word for it.

I guess you could say one is treading water if they're in trouble, but the metaphor of one being in hot water when in trouble is easily recognizable and understandable.

In the end, it will be your decision, but I personally think you ought to say they're in hot water.

Petrie · **Reply #54 on:** March 12, 2005, 11:22:00 PM

I'll skip the photo shoot thanks.

I'll take your word for it.

I guess you could say one is treading water if they're in trouble, but the metaphor of one being in hot water when in trouble is easily recognizable and understandable.

In the end, it will be your decision, but I personally think you ought to say they're in hot water.

Nick22 · **Reply #55 on:** March 14, 2005, 10:07:12 AM

well, that situation can also be called ' being in deep'. Whether you're iin quicksand or water, the term 's the same.
Nick

JojotheIncredible · **Reply #56 on:** March 20, 2005, 07:38:31 AM

I never heard "to be in deep water" before. I never understood it until you said something. Where I live, it was always "to be in deep (insert fecal matter here)" which would seem very inappropriate for a LBT fanfic. All I can say is that "to be in deep water" would be troublesome for people who never heard it before. I suggest you to explain it somewhere in the story.